A blog. On the internet. Where everyone can see it. With my face and name attached. Have I lost my mind? What am I thinking sharing my childhood trauma, my sexual abuse, in such a public way? Why don't I just keep it to myself or share it privately with the people closest to me? Why put it out there for the world to see?
These are the questions I have been asking myself for days, and in my darker moments imagine that people in my life are asking themselves. The answer is that for over thirty years I did keep it to myself. I kept it under lock and key buried so deep that it was like a cancer growing inside of me. I pushed the memories away and pretended that if I didn't speak it then it wasn't true. If I didn't tell anyone that I spent my childhood being raped by my stepfather and his friends then it wasn't real. All that I accomplished through my silence was a half life that left me wishing I was dead, that isolated me from my true self and the possibility of healing from the past.
A curious thing happened three months ago when I stood in front of a man on a ManKind Project New Warrior Training Adventure weekend and broke my silence for the first time. He didn't look at me with disgust. He didn't shame me or tell me to keep it to myself. He looked me in the eye and told me he was sorry and then he hugged me. I broke down in his arms sobbing. All of the fear and shame and guilt that I carried around, all of the societal messages about manning up, all of it was silenced by my voice and the loving response that followed. I half-lived in the silence for decades in darkness and suffering. It was only when I gave voice to my pain, when I spoke my truth, that the healing began. This space, this blog, is where I will continue to raise my voice and share the story of my childhood sexual abuse and my journey to heal from it. It is my hope that not only will I heal myself, but open the door for others to heal. To heal out loud.
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